AutoText tables with unwanted auto borders

S

Sol Apache

Hello

I have created a shaded table with some text but no borders and put it into
autotext. The problem is that when I call it up from autotext the new table
comes with borders I do not want.

How can I stop the borders from appearing?

I cannot find a default table setting, and in any case that may not be
relevant as other people will be using these on their PCs and their defaults
may have to change. Why can¹t Word just take my autotext as it was defined
by me?

Thanks for any help
 
B

Beth Rosengard

I just tried to repro this. I created the table, shaded it yellow and chose
Borders> None. When I click OK, the regular black borders change to a light
grey, which is how Word does this. The light grey borders don't print
though, which you'll see by going to Print Preview. When I make the
AutoText entry, the yellow table with light grey borders is entered and is
identical to the original from which I created the entry.

Is it the light grey borders which you object to or are the borders changing
to black when you use the Autotext entry?

What version of Word are you using?

--
***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
(If using Safari, hit Refresh once or twice ­ or use another browser.)
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>
 
S

Sol Apache

Hi Beth
Thanks for looking into this for me. I am using OSX.4 (Tiger) and Office
2004.
No, the borders aren¹t greyed out (ie the text boundaries) they are black
borders .75 whatever thick.

The borders are greyed out when I create the autotext, when I call the
autotext up for a new table, the black border automatically appears, ie real
black lines.
 
B

Beth Rosengard

Hmmm. I'm stumped. That's not how it works for me.

Try this: Quit out of all Office applications and go to
Home/Library/Preferences/Microsoft and pull these files to your desktop:

com.microsoft.Word.prefs.plist
Microsoft Office ACL [English] (You are using English, right?)

The first file contains your Word prefs and the second contains your
AutoCorrect list (ACL).

Now relaunch Word to force the re-creation of those files and then remake
the table and AutoCorrect entry again. What happens now? If the issue is
fixed, then one of those two files is corrupt, probably the ACL file. You
can figure out which one by dragging one of them back into the Prefs folder,
replacing the newly created file. (Quit out of all Office apps first.) If
things go bad again, that was the corrupt file.

If you determine that one of these files is the culprit, you'll have to
trash the corrupt file and reset your prefs or ACL entries, whichever one it
is.

Please let me know what happens.

--
***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
(If using Safari, hit Refresh once or twice ­ or use another browser.)
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>
 
D

Daiya Mitchell

Just by the way--AutoText entries are saved in the Normal template, so the
ACL file should not make a difference. But the original poster should test
Normal instead.



Hmmm. I'm stumped. That's not how it works for me.

Try this: Quit out of all Office applications and go to
Home/Library/Preferences/Microsoft and pull these files to your desktop:

com.microsoft.Word.prefs.plist
Microsoft Office ACL [English] (You are using English, right?)

The first file contains your Word prefs and the second contains your
AutoCorrect list (ACL).

Now relaunch Word to force the re-creation of those files and then remake
the table and AutoCorrect entry again. What happens now? If the issue is
fixed, then one of those two files is corrupt, probably the ACL file. You
can figure out which one by dragging one of them back into the Prefs folder,
replacing the newly created file. (Quit out of all Office apps first.) If
things go bad again, that was the corrupt file.

If you determine that one of these files is the culprit, you'll have to
trash the corrupt file and reset your prefs or ACL entries, whichever one it
is.

Please let me know what happens.
 
B

Beth Rosengard

I thought Sol was talking about an AutoCorrect entry and using the term
AutoText in error. You can't enter a formatted table in AutoText, can you?
Son of a gun, I guess you can 'cause I just did it. Seems an awkward way to
do it though.

Anyway, Sol, even when I enter the formatted table as an AutoText entry,
rather than an AutoCorrect entry, it is created with light gray, not black,
lines. But Daiya is right: In that case you need to test your Normal
template, not your prefs files. If you don't know how, see here:
<http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/MacWordNormal.htm>
(If using Safari, hit Refresh once or twice; better yet, use another browser
for this site.)

--
***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
(If using Safari, hit Refresh once or twice ­ or use another browser.)
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>




Just by the way--AutoText entries are saved in the Normal template, so the
ACL file should not make a difference. But the original poster should test
Normal instead.



Hmmm. I'm stumped. That's not how it works for me.

Try this: Quit out of all Office applications and go to
Home/Library/Preferences/Microsoft and pull these files to your desktop:

com.microsoft.Word.prefs.plist
Microsoft Office ACL [English] (You are using English, right?)

The first file contains your Word prefs and the second contains your
AutoCorrect list (ACL).

Now relaunch Word to force the re-creation of those files and then remake
the table and AutoCorrect entry again. What happens now? If the issue is
fixed, then one of those two files is corrupt, probably the ACL file. You
can figure out which one by dragging one of them back into the Prefs folder,
replacing the newly created file. (Quit out of all Office apps first.) If
things go bad again, that was the corrupt file.

If you determine that one of these files is the culprit, you'll have to
trash the corrupt file and reset your prefs or ACL entries, whichever one it
is.

Please let me know what happens.
 
J

John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]

Sol:

It sounds as though you have a Table Style applied?

I never use them: they're Toxic. One you have applied one, they're also
hard to get rid of, and they override other formatting.

In a default template, if you apply the Table Normal style, that should get
rid of the table style for you. If you have customised your Table Normal
style, you need to painstakingly set all of its properties back to "None" or
"Off" or whatever. The Table Normal style needs to be blank in every
respect, otherwise you can't use it to get rid of unwanted table formatting,
and you need to do this.

Edit>Clear Formats doesn't get rid of Table styles.

Hope this helps


Hi Beth
Thanks for looking into this for me. I am using OSX.4 (Tiger) and Office
2004.
No, the borders aren¹t greyed out (ie the text boundaries) they are black
borders .75 whatever thick.

The borders are greyed out when I create the autotext, when I call the
autotext up for a new table, the black border automatically appears, ie real
black lines.

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 4 1209 1410
 
D

Daiya Mitchell

Well, who knew we had Table Styles? :)


Sol:

It sounds as though you have a Table Style applied?

I never use them: they're Toxic. One you have applied one, they're also
hard to get rid of, and they override other formatting.

In a default template, if you apply the Table Normal style, that should get
rid of the table style for you. If you have customised your Table Normal
style, you need to painstakingly set all of its properties back to "None" or
"Off" or whatever. The Table Normal style needs to be blank in every
respect, otherwise you can't use it to get rid of unwanted table formatting,
and you need to do this.

Edit>Clear Formats doesn't get rid of Table styles.

Hope this helps
 
D

Daiya Mitchell

Beth, I had no idea you could create a table and save it in AutoCorrect.
Interesting! Though formatted AC entries are still saved in the Normal
template rather than the ACL.

I meant to include that link but accidentally sent the message too early.
 
B

Beth Rosengard

You're right! I forgot about that. So it's almost certainly a Normal
Template issue.

Beth
 
S

Sol Apache

Thanks John, Beth and Dalya: I haven¹t had time yet to get back to my border
problem, but I¹ll check out all your suggestions. I think I did tinker (in
ignorance) with the Table Normal style but I thought that was only to do
with the text in it, not the borders.

Thanks for all your help

Sol
 

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